Mulk calls to increase social security in rural areas
Business Recorder Islamabad
December 11, 2007
By Jonaid Iqbal
Magic of microfinance, reliance on the social capital of the people and real hard work was needed to increase social security in rural areas.
NWFP caretaker Chief Minister Shamsul Mulk stated this on Monday while opening the tenth three-day development conference hosted by the Sustainable Policy Development Institute (SDPI), an internationally recognised think-tank.
Shamsul Mulk, is also the Chairman of SDPI's Board of Governors. Besides Pakistan, 40-delegates from Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka are attending the conference. These delegates meet annually to share research findings for improving quality of life in countries of the region.
Speaking at the inaugural session, Mulk said poverty reduction programmes would be meaningful with real progress to help present day destablised South Asian societies to prepare for the challenges of the 21st century.
He said, without throwing up "innovative" solutions must be based on "local expertise that have survived generations of development," it would merely become an exercise in chanting mantras about reducing poverty.
'South Asia needed sustainable solutions to the problems of disaster management, environmental degradation, gender equality, illiteracy, insecurity, mortality, morbidity, poverty, which are common in the region, including Pakistan.' He also suggested that the solutions proposed by delegates must have multi-disciplinary approach, which are now badly needed to bridge the gulf between research and policy.
Chairman, National Rural Support Programme (NRSP), Shoaib Sultan, who also spoke in the session, elaborated his method of developing an area first relied on consulting the people about the priority required in an area, and also by making them responsible for carrying out the task.
We find that hundreds of people come forward in each area to assume leadership and responsibility.
A pre-ordained blue print could never do the work, he said, and in this regard he narrated dozen examples of areas and places where local people wrote success stories in their villages because the method used "social capital" of the local people.
Shoaib quoted the example of village across the river on the Silk Route. He had to reach the village in a basket, because there was no bridge.
This village was isolated without electricity, hospital, or school. Today, the same village had installed an indigenous hydel plant for producing electricity, and also had hospitals, clinics, schools, and other modern day gadgets, through self-help.
Shoaib Sultan paid tributes to his venerable teacher the late Akhtar Hameed Khan many times, who had taught how to improve the lot of poor societies, and how the establishment of support organisation, organised in such areas, would depend on the involvement of general members, not merely on executive officers.
Involving influential people at the top of the support organisations would mean disaster for the development project, as amply illustrated in the study of Indian Panchayat Committees, made prior to Independence.
In his welcome address, DPI acting executive director Dr Abdul Qayyum Sulehri, said his organisation provides research based policy advice to the government and civil societies of South Asia on sustainable development issues.
He complained that although the government had asked the SDPI to complete National Development Strategy, contribute technical in-put to health issues for Vision 2030, ad for domestic preparedness for service liberalisation, trade policy and laws related to farmers, and in formulating pro-poor agricultural initiatives, yet the institution was being starved of funds for research.
In the working session on development initiative and poverty environment nexus Aneel Salman described how micro financing in the field of cellular phones led by Gramin Bank was empowering BD women.
Differences over water: Conference calls for urgent resolution
Dawn Karachi
December 11, 2007
By Sher Baz Khan
Differences between Sindh and Punjab over water-sharing could lead to an inter-provincial conflict and even harm the federation if “heart-to-heart” talks were not held to resolve the issue, environmental experts attending an international conference on development warned here on Monday.
The differences, they said, were widening with time because the stand of Sindh was based on environmental concerns while Punjab wanted to use every drop of available water to ensure food security for its people.
According to them, at least four million people in Sindh were being directly hit by environmental degradation caused by lack of water, mainly due to policies formulated at the behest of Punjab.
In a heated political-cum-technical debate, a number of experts backed the viewpoint of Sindh and said food security at the cost of environment was not acceptable. The issue, they said, could not be resolved by accepting Punjab’s demand for building mega water reservoirs, including the Kalabagh dam.
Some experts were of the view that Sindh could get international support because its case was based on genuine concerns for environment. The issue would pose a major challenge to the new political set-up because as a federating unit Sindh felt sidelined and exploited, they said.
The Islamabad-based Sustainable Development Policy Institute has organised the three-day ‘Sustainable development conference’ to discuss and present sustainable solutions to problems of poverty, illiteracy, mortality and morbidity, environmental degradation and disaster management, gender inequality, insecurity and peace.
Experts from the United States, India, United Kingdom, Nepal, Bangladesh, Singapore and Germany, who are attending the conference, will present research papers on emerging issues.
In a paper on “Environmental law in Pakistan: international obligations and lower riparian Sindh”, political analyst and technocrat Akbar Kazi said that of eight committees constituted so far to devise a water-sharing formula between Punjab and Sindh, only two (the Rao Commission of 1941 and the Inter-Provincial Water Accord of 1992) could produce an agreement between the provinces. At present, he said, distrust had reached such a level that the matter required to be handled urgently.
Mr Kazi accused proponents of building big dams of hoodwinking the people by saying that Pakistan had 35 million acre feet of surplus water each year, which needed to be stored.
“This is not true,” he said, adding that there was no surplus water in the three main rivers —Indus, Jehlum and Chenab —nine months a year.
“Don’t make reservoirs. Just conserve water,” he maintained.
Some other experts backed Mr Kazi when he said the 1971 Fazl-i-Akbar committee, which had held meetings with the World Bank that had mediated the water issue between India and Pakistan, comprised junior engineers from Punjab.
Conference calls for urgent resolution: Differences over water
Dawn Karachi
December 11, 2007
By Sher Baz Khan
Differences between Sindh and Punjab over water-sharing could lead to an inter-provincial conflict and even harm the federation if “heart-to-heart” talks were not held to resolve the issue, environmental experts attending an international conference on development warned here on Monday.
The differences, they said, were widening with time because the stand of Sindh was based on environmental concerns while Punjab wanted to use every drop of available water to ensure food security for its people.
According to them, at least four million people in Sindh were being directly hit by environmental degradation caused by lack of water, mainly due to policies formulated at the behest of Punjab.
In a heated political-cum-technical debate, a number of experts backed the viewpoint of Sindh and said food security at the cost of environment was not acceptable. The issue, they said, could not be resolved by accepting Punjab’s demand for building mega water reservoirs, including the Kalabagh dam.
Some experts were of the view that Sindh could get international support because its case was based on genuine concerns for environment. The issue would pose a major challenge to the new political set-up because as a federating unit Sindh felt sidelined and exploited, they said.
The Islamabad-based Sustainable Development Policy Institute has organised the three-day ‘Sustainable development conference’ to discuss and present sustainable solutions to problems of poverty, illiteracy, mortality and morbidity, environmental degradation and disaster management, gender inequality, insecurity and peace.
Experts from the United States, India, United Kingdom, Nepal, Bangladesh, Singapore and Germany, who are attending the conference, will present research papers on emerging issues.
In a paper on “Environmental law in Pakistan: international obligations and lower riparian Sindh”, political analyst and technocrat Akbar Kazi said that of eight committees constituted so far to devise a water-sharing formula between Punjab and Sindh, only two (the Rao Commission of 1941 and the Inter-Provincial Water Accord of 1992) could produce an agreement between the provinces. At present, he said, distrust had reached such a level that the matter required to be handled urgently.
Mr Kazi accused proponents of building big dams of hoodwinking the people by saying that Pakistan had 35 million acre feet of surplus water each year, which needed to be stored.
“This is not true,” he said, adding that there was no surplus water in the three main rivers —Indus, Jehlum and Chenab —nine months a year.
“Don’t make reservoirs. Just conserve water,” he maintained.
Some other experts backed Mr Kazi when he said the 1971 Fazl-i-Akbar committee, which had held meetings with the World Bank that had mediated the water issue between India and Pakistan, comprised junior engineers from Punjab.
Research-based solutions can remove biases
Pakistan Observer Islamabad
December 11, 2007
By SHR Jahfery
"Research-based solutions will help us in removing our pre-conceived biases and can be the first step towards sustainable human development defined as the enhancement of peace, social justice and well-being, within and across generations.”
This was stated by the Caretaker Chief Minister NWFP Shams ul Mulk at the occasion of the Tenth Sustainable Development Conference organized by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) here Monday.
The Conference should not end at discussing the solutions that worked or that did not work, the next step should be to share the solutions put forward with community based organization leaders, government policy makers and NGO facilitators for future implementation, he said.
Mulk also launched SDPI’s ninth SDC anthology titled “Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives” at the Conference based on seventeen chapters and three sub-themes: Gender and Human Security, the Economics of Globalization, and People’s Rights and Livelihoods.
Dr. Abid Q Suleri, Acting Executive Director of SDPI, giving an overview of the Institute’s work, regretted that space for independent policy research both in terms of financial, as well as political terms was shrinking day by day. “Trans-disciplinary research—a research that also includes people’s perspective in defining the research problem, carrying it out, and disseminating it— is seldom appreciated by governments of the world including the governments in South Asia,” he said. He highlighted that independent research institutions such as SDPI are not being recognized by the Higher Education Commission as “Academic Research Institutes” for funding purposes and stressed upon the Chief Minister to press upon relevant circles so to get these criteria redefined.
Chairman of the National Rural Support Programme, Shoaib Sultan Khan, in his keynote address titled Poverty Reduction through Social Mobilization: Strategy and Challenges talked about the success of the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP) and rejected the notion of preconceived projects/programs at the macro level.
During the session on the Gender Digital Divide panelists called for the integration of a gender-sensitive approach at all policy levels. Aneel Salman from Rensselaer University, USA, discussed the Grameen Telecom’s initiatives in bringing a shared concept of telecommunication usage by the poor villagers in Bangladesh. “Convergence among telecommunication, computing, the media and the development of technologies associated with the Internet have brought Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) in the forefront of social decision making.” Some countries are being marginalized from the prospects of growth and development due to lack of access to telecommunication services.
Imran Sikandar Baloch, a civil servant of the Government of Pakistan, in his presentation said there is a social tendency to exclude women from decision-making, which affects both their lives and their participation in the paid work force.
During the session on Development Interventions and the Poverty-Environment Nexus, Dr. Babar Shahbaz, Visiting Fellow, SDPI, presented an exploratory analysis of stakeholders in the context of interventions in the forestry sector in NWFP.
Abrar Kazi, a political analyst, and Zulfiqar Halepoto, water and environmental columnist from Karachi in their joint paper “Environmental Law in Pakistan: International Obligations and the Lower Riparian, Sindh” pointed out that despite the fact that the Constitution of Pakistan contains provisions of laws that protect and conserve environmental resources, there is no implementation of these laws.
Prakash C. Tiwari from Kumaon University Nainital, Uttaranchal, India, said the Himalayan terrain imposes severe limitations on resource productivity levels, as well as on infrastructure efficiency. Rural poor are heavily dependent on CPR for their various resource needs, and livelihoods.
Shams: We have to mobilise resources to resolve problems
The Frontier Post Islamabad
December 11, 2007
F.P. Report
The caretaker Chief Minister of NWFP Shamsul Mulk has said that nobody will come from anywhere for the solution of our problems and we must mobilize our indigenous resources ourselves for the benefit of our people.
Addressing the opening ceremony of the 10th Sustainable Development Conference organized for Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) in Islamabad Monday morning he said that we are in a position where not only failure but even partial success is not the answer. Therefore, a strong commitment is required for the eradiation of poverty. He stressed that a strong commitment is the only answer to our problems, the problems of the people of the whole South Asia and hoped that those gathered together in the said three days Conference will hold candid discussions to their problems to find solution to it.
He said that we might be resource poor, but poverty comes from other areas, for easing the burden of poverty we must work as one nation and one unit. He said that the people from different countries would deliberate at the Conference upon their common problems and search indigenousness solutions for it.
He said that the knowledge share, partnerships and linkages built and the memories kindled over the next three days of the conference will be memorable for all the participants, not only memorable, but an occasion that would commit them to a continued and rigorous pursuit for the ideals of sustainable development.
Shamsul Mulk appreciated the SDPI for its two fold function: advisory role fulfilled through research, policy advice and advocacy; and an enabling role realized through providing other individuals and organization with resource materials to under take sustainable development agendas and activities.
He said that an attempt to find research based solutions and implementing them may not always lead to success. In many cases social, environmental and economic issues are complicated and no single strategy can be regarded as conclusive. However, research based solutions may help us in removing our preconceived biases and may be the first step towards the right direction i.e. sustainable human development defined as the enhancement of peace, social justice and well-being, within and across generations.
He said and pointed out that as this year’ conference of SDPI was coinciding with the United Nations Climate Change conference in Bali, Indonesia, where Pakistan was leading the developing countries group, G-77.
Climate change, he said is actually the issue of sustainable development and many countries in South Asia including Pakistan have remained under developed for decades and poverty, illiteracy, lack of healthcare ad morbidity hampered our progress, despite efforts to overcome them financially and practically. There can be many factors behind unsustainable development, resource mobilization and their utilization but he hoped that the fourteen panels, the SDPI had organized ---two of them specifically on poverty-environment nexus and one panel on disaster management will come up with valuable recommendations on these issues.
While in his opening remarks, the interim Executive Director of SDPI Dr. Abid Qaiyum Suleri high lighted the workings, aims and objectives of both SDPI and the Conference, Mr. Shuaib Sultan Khan delivered a detailed talk on Rural Development in South Asia particularly in India and Pakistan followed by an interesting and articulated question answer session.
Research-based solutions must for human uplift
The Nation Islamabad
December 11, 2007
By Our Staff Reporter
The caretaker chief minister NWFP Shams ul Mulk said on Monday research based solutions would help removing the pre-conceived biases that would be the first step towards sustainable human development defined as the enhancement of peace, social justice and well-being, within and across generations.
He expressed these views while addressing the opening session of the 10th Sustainable Development Conference (December 10-12) organised by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) here on Monday.
The conference should not end at discussing the solutions that worked or that did not work, the next step should be to share the solutions put forward with community based organisation leaders, government policy makers and INGO facilitators for future implementation, he said.
Shams ul Mulk launched SDPI's ninth SDC anthology titled "Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives" at the conference based on seventeen chapters and three sub-themes: Gender and Human Security, the Economics of Globalisation, and People's Rights and Livelihoods.
Dr. Abid Q Suleri, Acting Executive Director of SDPI, giving an overview of the institute's work, regretted that space for independent policy research both in terms of financial, as well as political was shrinking day by day.
"Trans-disciplinary research - a research that also includes people's perspective in defining the research problem, carrying it out, and disseminating it- is seldom appreciated by governments of the world including the governments in South Asia," he said.
He highlighted that independent research institutions such as SDPI are not being recognised by the Higher Education Commission as "Academic Research Institutes" for funding purposes and stressed upon the Chief Minister to press upon relevant circles so to get this criteria redefined.
Chairman of the National Rural Support Program, Shoaib Sultan Khan, in his keynote address on Poverty Reduction through Social Mobilisation: Strategy and Challenges talked about the success of the Aga Khan Rural Support Program (AKRSP) and rejected the notion of preconceived programs at the macro-level and said that for any program to be successful its micro-variations at the local level demand consultation and dialogues with each and every community.
During the session on the Gender Digital Divide panelists called for the integration of a gender-sensitive approach at all policy levels. Aneel Salman from Rensselaer University, USA, discussed the Grameen Telecom's initiatives in bringing a shared concept of telecommunication usage by the poor villagers in Bangladesh.
Imran Sikandar Baloch, a civil servant of the government of Pakistan, in his presentation said that there was a social tendency to exclude women from decision-making, which was affecting both their lives and participation in the paid work force.
"Unfortunately, the exclusion of women from ICT runs deep in government policies, thus depriving half the population from the potential benefits of ICTs," he said. Amongst others, he recommended the institutionalisation of gender-sensitive policies through a special working group, insurance of inter-ministerial collaboration as well as appropriate budgets for gender-mainstreaming in Pakistan's IT policy.
CM stresses utilising indigenous resources
The News Rawalpindi/Islamabad
December 11, 2007
Caretaker NWFP Chief Minister Shams ul Mulk has stressed the need for mobilising indigenous resources to attain self-sufficiency in all sectors of life.
Addressing the opening ceremony of the 10th Sustainable Development Conference organised by Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) in Islamabad, Monday morning he said, "we are in a position where not only failure but even partial success is not the answer. A strong commitment is required for the eradiation of poverty." Sham stressed that a strong commitment is the only answer to our problems, the problems of the people of S Asia and hoped that the participants of the conference would hold discussions to their problems to find solution to it.
Shams stresses research for development: Speakers underscore the need for gender-sensitive approach, women's share in decision-making
The Post Islamabad
December 11, 2007
By Staff Reporter
NWFP caretaker Chief Minister Shamsul Mulk has underscored the need for research-based solutions to achieve the target of sustainable human development.
"Research-based solutions will help us remove our pre-conceived biases and will be the first step towards sustainable human development, maintaining peace, social justice and well-being, within and across the generations," Mulk said while addressing the 10th conference on sustainable development.
Practitioners, civil society members and policy-makers will be sharing their knowledge for sustainable development at the three-day moot tilted 'Sustainable Solutions: A Spotlight on South Asian Research' organised by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) Monday.
Mulk launched SDPI's eighth SDC anthology titled 'Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives' at the conference consisting of seventeen chapters and three sub-themes - Gender and Human Security, Economics of Globalisation, and People's Rights and Livelihoods.
SDPI acting Executive Director Dr Abid Q Suleri gave an overview of his institute's work and lamented over lack of research on policy issues.
"Trans-disciplinary research - a research that includes people's perspective in defining research problem - is seldom appreciated by governments of the world including the governments in South Asia," he said.
He said independent research institutions such as SDPI were not being recognised by the Higher Education Commission as Academic Research Institutes for funding purposes.
National Rural Support Programme Chairman Shoaib Sultan Khan, in his keynote address on poverty reduction cited the success of the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP) and rejected the notion of preconceived projects/programmes at macro-level, saying for the success of any program, its micro-variations at local level demanded consultation and dialogue with each and every community.
Dr Akhtar Hameed Khan said development would not come from the top, rather it would come from the bottom and in pockets. During the session on gender digital divide, panelists called for the integration of a gender-sensitive approach at all policy levels.
Aneel Salman from Rensselaer University, USA, discussed Grameen Telecom's initiatives in bringing a shared concept of telecommunication usage by the poor villagers in Bangladesh.
"Convergence among telecommunication, computing, the media and development of technologies associated with the internet have brought Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) at the forefront of social decision-making," he said, adding that some countries were being marginalised from prospects of growth and development due to lack of access to telecommunication services.
Imran Sikandar Baloch, a civil servant, said there was a social tendency to exclude women from decision-making, which affected both their lives and their participation in the paid workforce.
"Unfortunately, exclusion of women from the ICT runs deep in government policies, thus depriving half the population of the potential benefits of the ICTs," he said. He recommended institutionalising gender-sensitive policies through a special working group for gender-mainstreaming in Pakistan's IT policy. UNIFEM Country Director Alice Shackelford chaired the session. During the session on Development Interventions and Poverty-Environment Nexus, Dr Babar Shahbaz, Visiting Fellow, SDPI, presented an exploratory analysis of stakeholders in context of interventions in the forestry in NWFP.
He said though stakeholders interacted at multiple levels from local to global, these efforts were not in synchronisation with ground realities.
Abrar Kazi, a political analyst, and Zulfiqar Halepoto, water and environmental columnist, from Karachi in their joint paper titled 'Environmental Law in Pakistan: International Obligations and the Lower Riparian, Sindh' said despite the fact that the constitution of Pakistan contained provisions that protected and conserved environmental resources, there was no implementation of these laws. Prakash C Tiwari from Kumaon University Nainital, Uttaranchal, India, said the Himalayan terrain imposed severe limitations on resource productivity levels, as well as on infrastructure efficiency.
He said common resources have deteriorated and depleted steadily and significantly leading to their conversion into degraded and non-productive lands.
Dr Peter Lund-Thomsen's paper from the Copenhagen Business School, which was read out in absentia, focussed on key linkages between the global valve chain, industrial clusters and corporate environmental responsibility literature, and the impact of donor-financed collective action schemes on supplier competitiveness, working conditions and environmental pollution within industrial clusters operating in Pakistan's leather tanning industry. Dr Nuzrat Khan from GC University, Lahore, chaired the session.
Research-based solutions help us in removing pre-conceived biases
The Statesman Peshawar
December 11, 2007
By Statesman Report
"Research-based solutions will help us in removing our pre-conceived biases and will be the first step towards sustainable human development defined as the enhancement of peace, social justice and well-being, within and across generations." This was stated by the Caretaker Chief Minister NWFP Shams ul Mulk at the occasion of the Tenth Sustainable Development Conference organized by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) on 10 December 2007.
The Conference should not end at discussing the solutions that worked or that did not work, the next step should be to share the solutions put forward with community based organization leaders, government policy makers and INGO facilitators for future implementation, he said. Mr Mulk also launched SDPI's ninth SDC anthology titled "Missing Links in Sustainable Development: South Asian Perspectives" at the Conference based on seventeen chapters and three sub-themes: Gender and Human Security, the Economics of Globalization, and People's Rights and Livelihoods.
Dr. Abid Q Suleri, Acting Executive Director of SDPI, giving an overview of the Institute's work, regretted that space for independent policy research both in terms of financial, as well as political terms was shrinking day by day. "Trans-disciplinary research -a research that also includes people's perspective in defining the research problem, carrying it out, and disseminating it- is seldom appreciated by governments of the world including the governments in South Asia," he said. He highlighted that independent research institutions such as SDPI are not being recognized by the HEC as "Academic Research Institutes" for funding purposes and stressed upon the Chief Minister to press upon relevant circles so to get this criteria redefined.
|
